Author: Marina

Hand Painted Door Knobs

When we renovated our flat a couple of years ago, we decided to keep the original doors throughout. We stripped them out to bare wood and repainted them white. Then we went shopping for some coloured door knobs, but we couldn’t find anything we liked. Mostly the ones we fancied were designed for cabinets, and not really suited for our doors. I did some searches online and came across some beautifully hand painted knobs by Sweet Mix Creation on Etsy. I really fell in love with all the colours and the simple designs. And I thought, why not, I can do this and so I did. We found some basic (meaning cheap!) white ceramic knob handles in our local diy store, they had to be slightly modified to fit our doors and that’s where my dad came in handy…he did a marvelous job!  
These are all the materials I used:
  • White ceramic knob handles, like these ones;
  • Ceramic Paint – I used the Marabu Ceramica Porcelain and Ceramic Paint in 15ml pots;
  • Round Nylon Brush – I used the Pro Arte Polar Brush no 4.
I did quite a number of sketches before choosing the design I wanted to go for, and this was fun too. I just used some felt tip coloured pens on sketching paper.
Once I made up my mind, I tranferred the design on the knob surface using an HB pencil. This was a bit tricky because the surface was curved and my hand had nothing to rest on.
Then the fun part begun. I used the paint stright from the pot, and literally dropped it onto the surface to make dots. If you attempting this, just a little bit of advice…don’t use too much paint otherwise the drop will start dripping on the side of the knob as the surface is not flat and you’ll end up with a paint drop rather than a dot…I know this from experience!

Then I let it dry for about 24 hours. Because I didn’t need the knobs to be waterproof, I didn’t oven-bake them.They have been serving us brilliantly so far and been added a subtle colour touch to our doors.

These are the ones I made for our living room to match the orange theme of the room. And the blue/turquoise ones are for our bathroom door. There are still two sets to do, a purple one for our bedroom and a green one for our kitchen. They are on my to-do list!

The 52 project: week 5

And I couldn’t be more grateful for this project hosted by Che & Fidel. Every week it gives me the opportunity to give my little Miss a closer look, to make notes of all the funny things she does, all the little steps she takes into toddlerhood, all the changes she goes through and all her emotions. It gives me the chance to collect an invaluable set of pictures documenting an entire year in my child’s life and also the chance to improve my portrait skills (which are lacking at the moment, but i’ve got my camera up and running now!).
This is her this week at lunch time.

 The learning face

 The watching face
The challenging face

This week you:

Let me cut your nails (sort of!) while you were awake.

Started to throw tantrums at meal times (sure we were going to prepare ourselves for the terrible twos, but definitely are not ready for the terrible 14 months!!).

Learned how to do the chicken by putting your hands under your armpits (hilarious!)

Shared your first pizza Capricciosa with your two girlfriends and loved it.

30 drawings in 30 days – Last set

#21/30 – Parco archeologico Scolacium, Roccelletta di Borgia, Italy

#22/30 – Pen & Wash exercise, from Cathy Johnson Art Tips  

#23/30 – Golfo di Squillace, Italy

#24/30 – Anthurium

#25/30 – Hosta

#26/30 – Torre Cavallara, Catanzaro Lido, Italy
#27/30 – Sedia di vimini, Catanzaro Lido, Italy

#28/30 – Athelstan Recreation Ground, Kingston upon Thames, UK

#29/30 – Summer Trees

#30/30 – Il porto, Catanzaro Lido, Italy

The last 10 drawings have been a completely different story. Say that the motivation begun to fade away, say that we came back home, say that I went back to work, say that the last 10% of a project takes 90% of the time to complete…I finished the last drawing this month! Shame, I know. I managed to do drawing #29 at the end of October, but really lost any motivation to do drawing #30 until the new year. But I finally did it and along with a new scanner I was able to put an end to this torture (this is what does to me any unfinished project!). Overall I’m glad I did it, even if it took more than 30 days. I will do something similar again, but maybe joining some group projects this time to keep things more interesting.
You can find the previous two sets of drawings here and here.

The 52 project: week 4

And I’m still very grateful for this project.
Although I only get to spend evening and weekends with little Miss O, although I’m taking crappy pictures with my phone, although she keeps moving every time I try to take a pic….I love snapping those moments when we are together, having fun and being happy.

Your first trip to IKEA 
(and yes you are not really allowed to have chips!)

Evening play

In the supermarket trolley
This week you:
Sighed (and laughed afterwards) every time you drank a cup of water (even during the night).
Refused to get your hair dried.
Had your first molar cutting through (or so we thought! We discovered you had the top two out already :)).
Had your immunisation shots and you did brilliantly us not so much!).
You had a lot of fun with your mama at the pool on sat morning.
Note: My goal in following weeks will be to improve my picture taking, this week has been not so great. I’m currently using my Iphone as my camera needs new batteries, they have been ordered, so fingers crossed they will arrive soon.

Blueberry muffins recipe

This is a very quick and easy recipe, you can’t go wrong! I somehow managed to do the mixing and the baking while Olivia was having dinner last night, and that, believe me, it’s a proof of what I’m saying!
It had been a while since I made muffins, or baked anything for that matter…and really after the holidays it has been a relief not having any evening treat lying around the house. But last night felt like we needed some homemade cake and with only one egg in the fridge, muffins were the answer. We did enjoyed them in front of the tv last night with a glass of milk and at breakfast this morning with espresso.